i’m doping

June 26, 2009

I was pretty excited to go riding this morning, cuz I haven’t gotten out lately as much as I’d like. I haven’t been sleeping so well, because Kim and I hadn’t noticed that the breaker on the main level air conditioner had tripped. I’m not so good at sleeping in a sauna. And, that all comes together to mean that sleeping poorly prevented me from getting up at 5am to go riding for most of the week.

Anyway. The plan was to leave Suncrest at 6:15 and ride down the south side, through Alpine, up American Fork Canyon to the top, and return. Probably my favorite road ride in the whole world, even when I’m fat and slow. Like now. (Mark’s ride report here. I link to it because I won the sprint. Win equals link. No win, no link. When it’s available, you’ll find the link to Elden’s video documenting my win here. Unless he edits out that part. You know. Because he lost. And I won.)

Last night, to ensure that I got the needed sleep, I took half an Ambien before bed. Now, I love Ambien for several reasons, but first and foremost, it guarantees a good night’s sleep the night before a big ride. Says that right on the bottle.

However, Ambien can also leave me a bit, how shall I put it, addled. You know. During the awake part.

I woke up this morning, stumbled into the closet, managed to put the bottom part of my cycling clothes on the bottom part of my body, and the top part on the top part. Then I wandered downstairs to get a bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch.

That’s when I first looked at a clock, and realized it was 1:05 in the morning. We’ve started riding earlier lately, but not usually THAT early.

I shrugged, had two bowls of cereal, and went back to bed. It’s all good.

My brother’s a commercial pilot and he’s got stories about passengers and Ambien. One lady took it and 45 minutes later stood up, stripped naked, and ran up and down the aisle mumbling to herself. They had to divert and land.

Another time, some poor airline employee flying for vacation took it before they took off. Turns out he got bumped to the next flight at the last minute and they couldn’t wake him up. They had to have the police come and remove him.

Two of our Sales guys were drug reps, so they subscribe to the “better living through chemistry” philosophy, and use medication to help them deal with travel. They tell me Lunesta is better – mellower than Ambien but still does the job and not so many weird dreams and other side effects (don’t tell the Fall Moab guys, Ambien antics are part of the fun).

One guy was traveling with a buddy who took Ambien and they had to reroute because of bad weather. They woke the Ambien guy up, landed, had an hour layover where they talked, then on another plane when the guy went to sleep again. Ambien guy had no recollection of the layover – he was absolutely sure he was asleep the whole time.

Also, the guy at work uses Ambien to sleep on the plane when crossing several time zones then Provigil (an anti-narcolepsy drug) to be wide awake in the new time zone in the morning. He says it completely knocks out jet lag.

dug, not sure you should have admit the drug use. This might lead to an escalating drug war. Now Rick will use No-Doze, then Mark takes speed, then I’m getting a blood transfusion from Brad while he’s asleep – how will it end? Not good, I fear.

rode mount mitchell in north carolina in the morning and drove back 12 hours through the night. 4 amps, 4 no-doze, 1 large mtn dew. arrived in florida and then did a 3 hr. ride bike ride.
ended up sitting on the curb at 7-eleven on A1A, crying my eyes out for no reason and heart rate is through roof. lying in bed that afternoon, my heart was still racing like sigourny weavers in the first ghost busters.

bikemike, how do you “flatlanders” prepare for a ride like Mt. Mitchell?!? I’ve ridden Mountains of Misery the last couple of years. As a 10,000ft+ of climbing century, it blows me away to see folks do well in it from flat areas. Just curious…

monster headwind. you ride out with the tailwind and get warmed up, then put it in the big ring and ride into the wind for a couple of hours…tah dah, instant mountain legs. invisible hills.

on a side note, it’s funny, we get alot of people coming into the bike shop, on vacation from colorado asking where the hills are, my response is, did you not look at the map before you came? it’s florida, it’s flat. i can only picture myself going out to boulder or somewhere in utah and asking where the beach is located.